Fifth wheel hitches for towing a trailer behind a towing vehicle have long been known in the art. Examples of state of the art fifth wheel hitches include those presently manufactured by Reese Products, Inc. of Elkhart, Ind. under product numbers 30026, 30027 and 30028 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,721,323.
These state of the art fifth wheel hitches include a support frame for mounting the hitch to the towing vehicle, such as, for example, to a bed of a pick up truck. This support frame includes a pair of mounting rails that are bolted to the bed and/or frame of the truck, side brackets that are releasably mounted to the rails and a head support mounted to the side brackets. A head assembly is mounted to the head support by means of a trunnion arrangement allowing for pivotal fore-and-aft movement. The head assembly includes a jaw assembly, operable by means of a control handle, that is specifically adapted to releasably engage and hold a king pin of a trailer desired to be towed by the towing vehicle.
While such state of the art fifth wheel hitches provide excellent overall performance and dependable operation, it is believed that improvements in design are still possible. More specifically, it is desired to manufactured such hitches at reduced cost without compromising the overall performance of the hitches in the field. State of the art fifth wheel hitches of prior art design generally include a relatively complex jaw assembly that includes a large number of component parts. As a result, most jaw assemblies of prior art design are expensive to manufacture. The complicated operation and interaction of the high number of parts also increases the difficulty of assembly. A need is therefore identified for an improved jaw assembly for a fifth wheel hitch.